Wednesday, September 19, 2007

This week's sack lunch tip is all about creativity. Lunch time will be more fun if you give your lunches a theme. You could even make it a game and see if your family can guess what the theme is but here are some ideas to get you started:

* An international day such as Mexico, Japan, Thailand, the Middle East, etc. and fix sample foods from that country or region. This doesn't have to be fancy, try guacamole and chips with salsa, spring rolls with sweet and sour sauce with a fortune cookie, hummus and a pita with olives and dates.

* Foods that are all the same color: spinach leaves on a pesto-tortilla with guacamole and fresh peas, bell peppers and lime yogurt.

* Foods that are all the same shape: melon balls, oyster crackers, slices of hard boiled eggs, slices of banana, slices of salami, a bagel, a tortilla or uncut pita.

* Foods for a pirate: cannonballs (grapes) and cannons (carrots), a dead man's chest (dip), a bottle of rum (juice box), goldfish crackers, Swedish fish and serve them with a little plastic toothpick sword. Include a "treasure" map and tattoo.

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comments:

I might have to try one of those if I can get creative enough - so far every lunch that Abby's taken to school in the past few weeks has had a theme of 'bologna sandwich'... That's my second challenge though. The first has been getting her to remember to actually bring the lunch box home after school every day! :)

Remember...September 19th is "Talk Like a Pirate Day. Seriously. The folks here in Galveston, TX (hey, used to be the home of famed pirate Jean LaFitte)and there was even an article about it over at ParentDish. Who knew?

http://www.parentdish.com/2007/09/18/talk-like-a-pirate-day/

So, today may be a good idea to use the pirate theme!

Love the ideas. I am always up for trying something a little less boring than the usual brown paper sack lunch!

My girls can't take sack lunches to school, but they just love it when I do theme lunches here at home.You give some great ideas, so far I've only tried all the same colors...ps I've read and really liked the book "A Year in Provence". The author doesn't live very far from where I do and so much of his story rings true with the life I am leading...in a down-scaled kind of way.

I love theme lunches for the kids I babysit for. Last week, their mom left a plate of "orange" lunch, complete with squash soup, mangoes (diced for the older, and pureed for the baby), carrots, and bits of cheese. It definitely makes it fun for the kids and the sitter or mommy or daddy or other caregiver. If I ever have kids, I will use your ideas, too.

I just went to costco today and bought all the prepacked -fruit snacks, fruit cups etc... These old ladies were scoffing at it - I would assume because it was all in boxes. That's how I fix lunches - I'm not that creative - but this just might inspire me to be :)